The invention disclosed herein pertains to a machine for packing and unpacking articles such as cans and bottles to and from cases or other containers.
Packing machines are now known which have continuous uninterrupted operating cycles rather that intermittent cycles. Existing machines are dedicated to either packing or unpacking cases or other containers. This means, for example, that in a bottle filling line two machines are required, one for unpacking empty bottles returned by consumers and another machine for packing cases with newly filled bottles. Separate machines for packing and unpacking cases require a substantial amount of space in a building along with the appropriate conveyors that they require to perform packing and unpacking operations. The limitation applies to existing packing machines such as are offered by various manufacturers and are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 4,793,762 and German patent application, DE-OS 41 25 573.
So-called double track packing machines are known as illustrated in German laid open application DE-OS 33 36 766. Combination packing and unpacking machines were proposed in German laid open application DE-OS 24 60 957. It is difficult to employ preexisting high performance machines in continuously operating production lines because empty bottles, filled bottles and cases for the bottles are fed intermittently.